Solving the Case
by littleoblivion
Summary: The criminology students can't help but ask questions when their normally serious and buttoned up instructor comes to class with lipstick on his collar. But the real question is, which lovely BAU lady does the lipstick belong to? Jotch fluff


**(Hey everybody! I hope everyone had a good Easter/Passover/spring weekend! This one shot is fulfilling a prompt on the Imagining Criminal Minds tumblr page. I hope you enjoy, and by all means leave a review!)**

"...but it doesn't make any sense. Like okay, sure! Raise the prices for the metro system. But what is it doing? Are the trains going to be on time? Are they cleaner? Are the annoying subway performers going to be any less frequent? The answer is no. It's still going to be the same crappy commute, only now it's more expensive. And don't even get me STARTED on peak fares. I mean you're already stuffed into a car with like, a hundred other grumpy morning commuters. Why should I be punished just because my job requires me to travel at the same time as most other DC residents? It's just… Hey, are you listening to me?"

Hanna doesn't even lift her eyes from her laptop screen where she was staring intently as she tabbed back and forth on her keyboard. "Yeah, of course," she mumbled under her breath.

"Hello… Earth to Hanna? What is so important that you're not even paying attention to my most deserved tirade against the Washington DC public transit system?" I shifted in my seat, trying to get a look at her screen.

She finally turns to face me. "Nat… How closely do you look at Agent Hotchner while he's lecturing?"

I can't help but stare at her as if she has grown an extra head. "I mean… I really want to pass this course and become an FBI agent, so I tend to pay attention to him when he's speaking, but I wouldn't say I check him out…" My eyes grow round and my jaw drops open. "Oh my god. You are hot for teacher. Admit it. You wake up every morning dreaming of his glorious five o'clock shadow and you have to battle with yourself throughout class to not launch yourself out of your desk and jump his sexy, sullen, stoic bones."

She wrinkles her nose at me. "What? No! Of course not! What is wrong with you?" She turns her computer so that I can see what she's been working on. "Okay so as you know, I make a habit of recording all of our lectures so I can go back and double check facts when I have questions."

I roll my eyes at her fastidious study habits. "I mean sure. What does that have to do with your torrid love affair with Agent Hotchner?"

She ignores me and begins to pull up screen pulls from past classes. "Okay so check this out. This is from our lecture on arsonists, like four months ago."

I lean in and look at the picture of Agent Hotchner she had pulled up on her screen. He's standing at the podium, arm outstretched towards the PowerPoint screen. "Yeah, sure. That's him."

"Okay but look." She hits a few keys and the picture zoomed in on his face. "Look at his collar."

I stare at her close up. "What about it?"

"There. Right on the inside of his collar. Do you see it?"

I move in closer and squint at his shirt. "See what? What am I suppose to be looking at?"

"Nat! Right there!" She groans and zooms in even closer.

"Wait… is that-"

"Lipstick. Yes. On Agent Hotchner's collar. As in, sometime between him getting dressed in the morning and him coming to teach us, he had a very romantic rendezvous with someone."

"Alright! Get it, SSA Hotchner!"

"But that's not all. Look at these other photos." A couple more key strokes and four additional pictures join the first on her laptop screen. "All from lectures following the arson lesson. All starring our beloved teacher, all with various shades of lipstick on his collar. Meaning that this was not a one off thing! He's seeing someone! And considering that the average FBI agent arrives at the office around seven am and our class convenes at eleven, this mystery woman has to be someone who works here, seeing as he wouldn't have time to leave and meet her."

"He's banging someone that works here?" I can't help but screech. Several heads whip around to look at us.

"Natalie, keep your voice down!" Hanna hisses at me, tilting her laptop screen so that our classmates don't see her research. "We don't want him to get in trouble!"

"Sorry…" I whisper sheepishly. "So… He's banging someone who works here, right?"

"Right," she agrees. "Now, it could technically be anyone, but I think it has to be someone who works closely with the BAU. The teams work independently, and it would be really difficult to try to plan a tryst when the two teams happen to both be at home in Quantico. Plus, it would be difficult to explain why he was spending time with someone from a different unit."

I pull my hair into a ponytail and open up Chrome on my own laptop. "Okay, it's a female agent who works closely with the BAU. Let's take a look at our potential unsubs." I bring up the agent directory and filter as necessary. "So… we have Section chief Erin Strauss, technical analyst Penelope Garcia, and special agents Jennifer Jareau and Emily Prentiss."

"So I think we can rule out Chief Strauss. The color of lipstick on his collar tends to be a light pink, but can sometimes be a darker mauve. I've never seen her wear lipstick that wasn't strictly a nude color. So it can't be her."

"Yeah," I snort, "also that would be super gross. Can you imagine the two of them going at it like horny teenagers?"

"Focus, focus. Now the same goes for the tech analyst, Garcia."

"Well yeah. None of the lipstick was like, turquoise or neon green."

"Exactly. Which just leaves both of the supervisory agents, Jareau and Prentiss."

"Hmm…" I stare at both of their pictures on my web browser. "I mean it could be either one."

"I bet it's Agent Jareau. Before she became a profiler, she served as the media liaison. Apparently they worked closely to pick the cases the BAU investigated."

"But she's not the liaison anymore," I remind her.

"That's true, but I cross referenced both of their names with local newspapers, and Hotch's first wife was a blonde, which would lend itself to a type-"

"-Hanna, just because he was married to a blonde, doesn't mean he only likes blondes-"

"-but most importantly, I found the birth announcements from both of their sons, and they attend the same school and play in the same soccer league, which Agent Jareau helps coach when she can. Which I think we can agree means they still spend quite a bit of time together."

"Holy shit, how much time have you spent thinking about this? Like, how did you manage to get any homework done?"

"Plus, in her picture, Agent Prentiss is wearing darker lipstick, almost a mulberry. Nothing like the pink in the picture."

"But I mean, it could still be her! She looks like someone who specifically disregards every rule set forth by the FBI."

"Well that's true. But I would bet money it's Agent Jareau-"

"What, how will we ever possibly know who-"

"I will bet you five dollars-"

"Hello everyone, I apologize for running a few minutes behind. Please take your seats and we'll get started shortly." I sit back in my seat and turn my attention to our teacher as he takes his place behind the podium. Hanna hits me in the arm, but I already see what has her in a tizzy. Now that I've been made aware, it's glaringly obvious.

As he goes about bringing up today's lesson on the projection screen, we can see a small smudge of what is unmistakably pink lipstick on the inside of his collar.

"See it happened again-"

"I know, Hanna, I have eyes, I can-"

"Ladies, care to share with the class?" We both sink a little lower in our seats and shake our heads at our instructor. He nods back at us and turns back to the screen.

"Okay so today we are going to be taking a specific look at what used to be known as the homicidal triad. It is also known as the triad of sociopathy but it's actual name is The MacDonald Triad. It first proposed in 1963 by the psychiatrist-"

"Excuse me, Agent Hotchner? You uhm, you left this file on my desk." Hanna is once again punching me in the arm, but I simply reach into my bag and pull out my wallet, slapping a five dollar bill on to her desk. Because standing in the doorway of our lecture hall, case file in hand, is none other than SSA Jennifer Jareau. And even if you were to disregard the faint blush staining her cheeks, the uncharacteristic messiness of her blonde waves, and the mischevious twinkle in her eye, the soft pink lipstick gracing her lips irrefutably solved the case of what, or more accurately who had made Agent Hotchner late for class.


End file.
